Monday Morning Impact – October 5

Perficient Acquires Services Firm

Perficient, Inc., a St. Louis-based IT and management consulting firm serving large enterprise customers, announced it has acquired Market Street Solutions, Inc., a $10 million annual services and software revenue IT consulting firm specializing in the development, implementation, integration and support of big data, analytics and financial performance management solutions.

“We are excited to strengthen our analytics capabilities with this small yet strategic acquisition,” said Jeffrey Davis, Perficient’s chief executive officer and president.

The estimated $5.3 million transaction expands Perficient’s IBM analytics footprint, and also extends the company’s geographic footprint, particularly in the southwestern United States. Inbound clients as a result of the acquisition are expected to include Cigna-Healthspring, Cracker Barrel, Diversicare Healthcare Services, Electric Power Board, LifePoint Health, North Highland, Pilot Travel Centers, Protective Life Insurance Corporation, TeamHealth and Varsity Brands.

Traded on the Nasdaq Global Select Market, Perficient is a member of the Russell 2000 index and the S&P SmallCap 600 index. Perficient is a Premier Level IBM business partner, a Microsoft National Solution Provider and Gold Certified Partner, an Oracle Platinum Partner, and a Platinum Salesforce Cloud Alliance Partner.

Channel Impact
This move extends Perficient into an important area that is consistently expanding in importance. While it is a relatively small acquisition in terms of dollar volume, the long-term ramifications can be substantial.

Citrix Appoints New Vice President of Partner Strategy and Sales

Citrix has named Kimberly Martin as the company’s new vice president of partner strategy and sales, reporting to Carlos Sartorius, senior vice president, worldwide sales and services.

Martin’s history includes an extensive background in channel program design and development, partner marketing and channel incentive design. Most recently, she was vice president of worldwide business development and partner at Datameer where she built a partner ecosystem and established partner programs in the Hadoop technology space. She has also served as vice president of worldwide channels at Informatica, and led Microsoft’s EMEA channel business for several years. Previously, she worked at Andersen Consulting and then Accenture consulting on sales and channel transformation for technology companies including EMC, Cisco, Dell and HP.

Channel Impact
Though future strategic plans were not disclosed at the time of the announcement, Martin brings solid channel credentials to the role.

Aryaka and Avant Sign North American Distribution Agreement

Aryaka, a northern California-based WAN as-a-Service company, has announced a distribution agreement with Avant, which comes to the table with a substantial sub-agent network of telecom sales and consulting professionals that can help to raise revenues in the context of a services sale.

“For many years, companies have been looking for a viable business-grade alternative to costly and cumbersome MPLS infrastructures that can leverage the public internet,” said Chris Vivian, VP of global partner alliances at Aryaka. “As global momentum builds in cloud offerings, companies are looking for an enterprise-class connectivity option to their cloud services.”

As enterprise networks evolve in response to globalization and cloud services adoption, legacy approaches such as MPLS and CapEx intensive WAN Optimization appliances are no longer adequate to the new business models, thereby lending credibility to WAN-as-a-Service offerings. Aryaka claims a customer base of more than 10 million users across more than 4,000 sites globally. Leading brands include AstraZeneca, Skullcandy, Air China, Freescale Semiconductor, and ThoughtWorks.

Channel Impact
Extending access to partners familiar with the agency model is clearly parallel for a company in the WAN-as-a-Service space. While the emphasis on added value is clearly important in the services space, the model is generally aligned with that of the telecom space.